Encoding VCD & SVCD in FlaskMpeg using LSX

You need the following software for this guide:

SVCD Pack
Pulldown
Bitrate Calculator
VideoServer
LSX Plugin - NOTE: Demo version, you can buy the full version online. Homepage
Nero - NOTE: Demo version, you can buy the full version online. Homepage

Note that LSX does not support 3:2 pulldown for 23.976fps NTSC movies but it's nevertheless possible to encode your movie at 23.976fps (let LSX complain about non-compliancy, it doesn't matter) if you use pulldown at the appropriate position.

Step 0 - One time setup

To set up the Videoserver, unzip it to its own directory, then copy CM-Avisynth.prm to the directory where you have Xmpeg/FlaskMpeg and rename it to CM-Avisynth.cm.flask. Also, unzip bbmpeg.zip from the videoserver directory to the Xmpeg/FlaskMpeg folder and do the same for pulldown.zip and wav2mp_1_1.zip. You only have to perform these steps once.

Step 1: Rip the DVD

Note: All you need from that guide is the File mode part. Please disregard any reference to the other DVD Decrypter modes.

Step 2: Calculating the bitrate

You can use any regular bitrate calculator, the only important thing is that you respect the CD sizes that are applicable for VCD/SVCD (they can contain more than for a comparable data CD).

Step 3: Set up audio

Xmpeg is a modified version of FlaskMpeg with a different interface, certain very useful additions and it can work in the native YUV2 colorspace which speeds up encoding considerably compared to the regular FlaskMpeg. If you've used FlaskMpeg before Xmpeg won't be hard to use. Unfortunately LSX does not support YUV2 data but we can still make advantage of Xmpeg's other features.

Step 4: Set up video and frameserver

Now it's time to properly resize and start frameserving.

Step 5: Encoding the video

Now it's time to encode the video in LSX.

Step 6: Encoding Audio

As mentioned before due to CCE's audio encoding problems we're going to do this separately using TMPG & toolame. . The program we use also yields a higher quality audio then using CCE to do this.

Step 7: Splitting to CDs

If you have an NTSC source and have not encoded at 29.97fps interlaced (most of the cases) you'll have to run the video thru pulldown. Then multiplex it using bbMPEG which creates guaranteed specs compliant streams and at the same time it can split the movie at the appropriate positions.

Step 8: Burn

The last step is burning the video in Nero or a cue/bin capable burning tool.

This document was last updated on 06/19/02